yea, they give us stuff to do: position reports, equal time point monitoring, divert field status, fuel plan validation, winds PIREPs (pilot reports), and if you have it, you dial up the HF radio and try to listen to canadian/european stations.
not as easy as it may seem, for instance
I flew across the atlantic and halfway there I had the shut down one my engines.... yea ... definitely not bored then.

1) no, those guys overflew hawaii cause they were lousy pilots.

2) big planes (I got thousands of hours in them) absolutely have to use autopilot, and it is required when crossing the "pond" on the north atlantic tracks.

3) auto pilot makes air refueling easier on the reciever (he is stuck with manal however)

Autoland came about in the 60's, (along with auto-flare and auto-throttles, i believe) - the 747 had auto brakes and spoilers upon WOW (weight on wheels) - I am pretty sure no one taxis on autopilot, maybe the global hawk. The next step is Cat III C ils.
I am pretty sure there are systems that simply takeoff as well - I know certain autothrottle systems are made to operate before takeoff roll

Well, I agree, why not have three legs, or one leg and really good balance, or legs with spheres as the feet, or well - I can think of many many variants, but if I wanted something that could get across almost any terrain, it would have four legs for sure (or the ability to hover) instead of just focusing on making a humanoid. j

As a student of war, I cannot agree more: even as a participant of these recent hostilities, I recognize, and have been taught, that the purpose of war IS NOT revenge (or retaliation). War occurs in many forms, but the one's involving "killing people and breaking things" tend to get folks all (rightfully so) upset.
War is a way to get somebody (a leader/and its people) to do something they refuse to do otherwise.



ps: let's please stop getting all sniffy about war hurting civilians, it hurts pretty much everybody.

I totally agree, let me quote myself:
'There are way more important things in life than, well, "things". '
ideas, theories, science, politics are all worthwhile (among many others), although it is presumptive of me to decide for anyone else what is important.
I will step out on the limb and say that, unless you are a museum curator, art dealer, or collector of rare, storied, artifacts, "things" are a bit less meaningful to devote your life to. having said that, has anyone seen my stapler? -sent from my cray-

I actually took the time to read the final fbi report This guy was mentally unstable well before the attacks, he was obsessed with some sorrority, with female co-workers, and was quite openly discussing his mental illness with co-workers. (why he was still in charge of antrax - astonishes me) The most interesting part is the new science that came out of the investigation (some kind of new dna sequencing method) either way, this guy was nuts before the fbi got involved (imho)

The first sign of trouble is when you said/thought, at least I am not as bad as X. oh goodness.
The second sign: an intervention by way of watching a tv show devoted to your disease.
Take it from a former hoarder: just throw everything away (donate, trash, etc). There are way
more important things in life than, well, "things". Once you start spending as much time, energy,
and care for the people in and around your life, I doubt you will ever hoard again.

-sent from my cray-

where is the outcry against "cowardly" IED's and homicide-bombers?

read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fog_of_war . it will enlighten you.

also: there are civilians, and there are noncombatants... there is a difference.

unless you have been to war, you really know nothing about it.

cheers
J

clausevitz, jomini, study them. To even ask the question of explaining morality in war suggests you might have thought there should be morality in war. I am sorry you got that impression. A short essay on my thoughts and others:
War is an extension of politics - clausevitz. In the quest to get some power/people/entity to stop doing something (invading, destabilizing, living in some land you want) you must find a way (a policy) that convinces them (harasses them) such that continued pursuit of the policy you abhor (invading, destabilizing, living in some land you want) is NOT in their best interests. Since kings/presidents/governments tend to listen to their people _before_ they listen to some other king/president/government - your task as a war strategist: convince the king/president/government to stop the behavior you abhor (invading, destabilizing, living in some land you want) by causing chaos and fear amongst his population (the people who pay for the invading, destabilizing, living in some land you want activities). This could be peaceful (voice of america), cruel (trade emabargoes, sanctions), or violent (killing them / breaking their stuff until they see your way)

Jomeni advocated bombing the city centers (al queda have you been studying jomeni?) to cause chaos.
This method of warfare dominated US strategy during WW2 (nagasaki, hiroshima, fire bombings: germany, japan) and briefly during linebacker 2 of the vietnam war.
This is also the method of warfare of "terrorists" since beirut. Using largely ineffective, but spectactular effects to scare people. (cars/heart attacks/cancer kill way many more people than terrorists)

Recent glamorization of war (going back as far as the chivalry movement of the knights to cut down on the sheer barbarism of war) since WW2 has led to this thought of "civilians" - people who have nothing to do with war - and thus don't deserve to be targeted: it is merely a myth to calm the palettes of doves to convince them that war isn't really all that bad. Which of course is not true.

Once we stop the idea of "civilian" - I think people will realize that we all are responsible for the people we put in office, and it is our responsibility to stop them from expressing anything other than our intent when it comes to war. we are all in this fight, whether it be school teachers educating the next marines, or even the grocery store, our taxes fund the war machine and are a collective message to the rest of the world on our approval of the current war we are in.

in short: war was never meant to be moral - it is simply getting a country to do something they do not want to do, by means of strategic maneuvering (bombs, trade, money, isolation, invasion, eradication)